Nicolas Joseph Maison

Nicolas Joseph Maison, marquis de Maison (; 19 December 1771 – 13 February 1840) was a French military officer who served in the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars, and as commander of the Morea expedition during the Greek War of Independence. He was made a Marshal of France in 1829 and served as Minister of War from 1835 to 1836.

Revolutionary Wars and Napoleonic Wars Nicolas-Joseph Maison was born in Épinay-sur-Seine, near Paris on 19 December 1771. He enlisted in the Army in 1789 and on 1 August 1791, he was named captain in the 9th Battalion of Volunteers of Paris and served in the infantry in the early French Revolutionary Wars. He served as aide-de-camp to Minister of War Jean Bernadotte in 1799. At the Beresina he was promoted to General de division and made a baron of the Empire. In 1814, he was tasked with defending what is now Belgium and the port of Antwerp. With inadequate forces, he managed to hold his own against greatly superior Allied forces and defeated Johann von Thielmann's Saxons at the Battle of Courtrai. This expedition consisted in a land intervention of the French Army in the Peloponnese at the time of the Greek War of Independence, with the aim of liberating the region from the Turkish-Egyptian occupation forces commanded by Ibrahim Pasha. Although he returned to France after 8 months, the French kept a military presence in the area until 1833. He left Greece on 22 May 1829.

Later life In 1830, Maison supported the July Revolution and served in November 1830 as Minister of Foreign Affairs for a couple of weeks, before being sent to Vienna as ambassador. In 1833 he was made ambassador to Russia in St. Petersburg. Maison served as minister of war from 30 April 1835 to 19 September 1836 after which he retired from public life.

Nicolas-Joseph Maison died in Paris on 13 February 1840. He is buried in the Père Lachaise Cemetery (division 5).

Honors, military grades and decorations Name engraved on the Arc de Triomphe (Eastern pillar, Column 13 and 14). Ennoblement: Baron of the Empire (2 July 1808). Count of the Empire (14 August 1813). Marquess (31 July 1817). Successive military grades: National Guard: Grenadier, Corporal, Sergeant major, then Captain. Army: Captain on 1 August 1792, Battalion commander (6 July 1796 provisionally, 16 August definitively), Adjutant general brigade chief on 3 July 1799, General of brigade on 10 February 1806, then Divisional general on 21 August 1812. Dignities: Peer of France on 4 June 1817. Marshal of France on 22 February 1829. French decorations:

60px Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor on 28 September 1813.

60px Grand Cross of the Order of the Reunion on 19 November 1813. 60px Grand Cross of the Order of Saint Louis on 30 September 1818. Foreign decorations: 60px Bavaria: Knight of the Military Order of Maximilian Joseph of Bavaria (1806). 60px Greece: Grand Cross of the Royal Order of the Redeemer (1834). 60px Spain: Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Charles III (1835).

Political offices